


Tala no more

by Kheta



Series: Moana and Modern-Day Stereotypes [1]
Category: Moana (2016)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-18
Updated: 2017-08-18
Packaged: 2018-12-16 16:54:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11832990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kheta/pseuds/Kheta
Summary: When she’s seven Tala moves from Motunui to New Zealand. English doesn’t quite wrap around her tongue properly and her parents are both factory workers and when people start telling her to shut up, she listens.Or how the name Tala loses its meaning.





	Tala no more

Tala is a name she is proud of, gifted to her by her great-great grandfather Tuitala, a title teller. Kuikui’s name was Tusitala, story teller, though she didn’t have the honour of meeting her. Uncle Suitala as oldest of his generation also carries Tala in his name. It was a chain of names that reminded her where she came from, from a line of tellers.

She grew up proud of her heritage, her lips weaving stories and telling truths and she could never stop talking. Her aiga loved her voice, would entertain her as Fa’e made kava and tapa’s and Baba grew taro in the scorching sun. Her voice would echo around their warm island, the tales of it reaching the nearby seas. The firm love in her voice keeping smiles on their faces as they weaved and fished and grew on their island home.

However times change and the island grows scarce, they need money and resources and Baba is their only hope. So they leave her uncles and aunties behind, her cousins send her sad waves, hopeful smiles damp at the edges as their song-bird sails away to the land of Milk and Honey.

New Zealand is big, the Auckland city towers higher than any Niue tree she’s ever seen, impersonal and so far away from the roots of grass. It is taller than even the mountains and hills across Motunui. The weather is colder than she is used to, wind blowing, rain falling and sun setting within the same few hours of each other. Tala does not understand this huge city, with its people close in physical distance, but faces marred with frowns and sprits more distant than she has ever felt before.

More than the coldness sweeping over the building though, Tala did not understand the people. Even those like her, are not like her. Iaone talks loudly and plays rugby and acts like he can't understand her when she speaks to him, though she knew he understood her with how he stared. Fa’e reassures her that the people will become more used to her, that she is too bright for these dreary city dwellers, but in the sea of white and white-washed classmates her too brown skin and too big tongue and too bushy hair sets her apart. Baba and Fa'e cannot hold her in the nights where she is too cold in their one room apartment, for work keeps them occupied. Their family makes more in a week here than they did in two working weeks during harvest, yet money is still scarce.

Tala’s books are used and browning, her shoes three sizes too big so she can grow into them, her food left over dinner cooked with love. Because of this her classmates avoid her, whisper about her in a language she doesn’t fully understand. Words are harsh and lumpy on her tongue, she holds in the tears everyday as teachers pick on her for not understanding and she tells no more. Seals her lips in shame, stops her midnight prayers until she can say Auckland and New Zealand _properly_. Nods or shakes her head when her parents manage to fit in a conversation with her between their full working hours.

Her name is Tala Waialiki, but she feels less like a Tala with every passing day. It seems easy to rid herself of her culture at eight years old, to shed the skin she was born with, but it hurts more deeply than she can ever explain. She peel back the layers of her ancestors and their heritage with the force of a thousand spit-fire words and too heated glares. Tala is still her name but it was no longer a chain that bound her to her culture, rather a small factor of who she was. Something no longer important. Something that hurt too much if she made it important in this too cruel city.

The people at school still stare and talk, but she starts to talk back and her roars are intimidating even at her young age. Her hair is too bushy, her skin too brown, but her too big tongue can twist over confusing words and her teachers can no longer nit-pick her mumbled answer and if she’s whiter, her tongue thinner, maybe then she will fit in. She will be more than another coconut in the back of class.

* * *

 

She is fourteen the next time they travel home. The warm winds greet them, the smell of natural ocean pools and the sound of her cousins working in the fields. It is odd to be home, her eyes used to dark clouds Motunui only receives during storms, her ears accustomed to blaring cars that aren’t necessary on their island. The sound of her language pangs in her heart because she knows this beautiful sound, but her too thin tongue can’t wrap around the forbidden words as her cousins speak happily.

As the days roll by, they judge her accent, judge her harsh way of speaking as she refuses her culture. Dub her a _fia palagi_ , when they don't know how much she hurt when she gave her culture up. Though her lips form long since spoken words, she can’t find the voice for it and her tongue knots.

Home had once been this beautiful island and her thoughts still regarded Motunui as home, but on this home of hers she feels lost and out of contact. Her cousins don't smile at her anymore. Her Aunties and Uncles look disapprovingly at her. It hits her suddenly that she has no home.

Sane and Tevita are nice, they call her sis and invite her to their houses and their parents are both factory workers as well, but neither are from Motunui. Both were born in New Zealand. To them home is Auckland. They would not understand this inbetweeness she feels. Tala is fourteen and without home and it is a bitter shock to her guarded heart.

They stay for three days and she is grown with a child the next time she visits Motunui.

**Author's Note:**

> I am fluent in none of the languages mentioned, with most slang being taken from friends and their family. Because of the ambiguous nature of where Motunui is, I tried to include the use of various poly, micro and melanesian cultures. I wrote this a while ago so I can't remember exactly which islands I used, but there's a small emphasis on Samoan language because I know Tusitala in Samoa in a story-teller (Shout out to the main Selina Tusitala-Marsh for being a cool lecturer and telling us that.) Use of somewhat derogatory terms are for impact and are not acceptable in real life situations, pls be cautious with your language no matter what.


End file.
